James Dean Bradfield: pictured at the recent Festival Number 6Andrew Whitton

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Nicky Wire on stage in 2011PHOTO:

Will Hodgkinson

Last updated at 12:01AM, September 25 2013

Decades after their guitarist vanished, Manic Street Preachers have revised the midlife manual, reports Will Hodgkinson

In 2010, Nicky Wire faced a crisis. For the first time, he wondered just how
much longer he could carry off being a star-jumping, cross-dressing,
controversy-generating bassist and songwriter in one of the UK’s biggest
bands.

“It was after a gig in Cambridge,” says Wire, a genial 44-year-old who, with
his pink jacket, Aviator shades and rangy frame, still does a good
impression of a rock star. “I came off stage. I had silver leggings from Top
Shop, a school blazer, nothing on my feet, make-up everywhere and I could
hardly walk. And I looked at myself in the mirror